


Eliot Spencer's Moving Castle

by OldWomanJosie



Category: Howl's Moving Castle - All Media Types, Leverage
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-16
Updated: 2014-10-16
Packaged: 2018-02-21 11:15:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2466251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OldWomanJosie/pseuds/OldWomanJosie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The moving castle of the mighty and fearsome wizard Eliot was not the safest place for young women. But Parker was no ordinary young woman. And she really didn't have much of a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eliot Spencer's Moving Castle

The moving castle of the mighty and fearsome wizard Eliot was not the safest place for young women. But Parker was no ordinary young woman. And she really didn't have much of a choice.

When Parker found the castle, or rather when it almost ran her over, she was not having a very good day. A simple run-of-the-mill heist, one that a thief of her caliber would normally find easy, turned out to be not so easy after all. Parker found out that in stealing things from a witch, one sometimes steals something that's cursed. So it was with the necklace that she stole from Sophie, the Witch of the Wastes. The amulet transformed Parker into an old woman and the thief couldn't take it off. The witch herself only laughed when she caught Parker in her predicament and airly proclaimed that she had no idea how to fix it. Not one to be outdone by a stupid curse, Parker set out into the wilds to find herself a wizard or witch to unenchant the wretched thing around her neck so that she could get back to scaling walls and slithering through windows again.

Hiking the wastes was not as easy as she remembered it (being eighty something does a real number on the body) and Parker was just about worn to the bone when she heard a great creaking and groaning. The ground under her shook and without warning a monstrous thing loomed out of the evening mist. Gasping in astonishment, Parker looked up at the legendary moving castle.

Now Parker knew the stories: how the wizard Eliot was wicked and evil and how he loved to bewitch young girls and eat their hearts, but right then she was more tired than she had ever been and cold to boot. Besides, Eliot liked beautiful maidens. He surely wouldn't harm an old woman. So Parker trotted as fast as her aged legs would carry her and swung up onto the doorstep.

She cautiously turned the handle of the door and peeked inside. It was dark in there, with only the faint glow of a dying fire on one side of the room to light it. She couldn't see anyone within, but since no one yelled at her and there was no flash of lightning to strike her down, she figured it was alright to go on in.

Parker shuffled inside and dragged her weary frame up the steps. She was faced with a cavernous room with a fireplace on one side. The room was filled with all sorts of...everything. Parker couldn't even begin to process the amount of paper and books and bags and boxes and... Her thief's mind went into overdrive thinking of the possibilities. But her old lady body was dead tired, so she threw some wood on the fire from the bin beside it and settled down to doze in the one clean chair there was. She was just beginning to drift off when a voice broke into her rest. 

"What do you think you're doing?"

Parker's eyes popped open and she scanned the room quickly. "Who said that?" She'd thought she was alone.

"Never mind who I am, who are you? Do you know where you are right now?"

Parker couldn't believe what she was hearing. She looked down and, sure enough, the fire was talking to her. It was also staring at her with something of an attitude. Once the flame saw that it had her attention, it went on.

"I know you're under a curse and all, anyone can see that, but that's no excuse to barge into someone else's home and place of business!" It huffed indignantly, which made Parker giggle out loud.

"What are you?" she asked it curiously. "Fire doesn't talk."

"But I do," it said, puffing itself up with pride. "I am Hardison, the scary and powerful fire demon!" He sent up a gout of flame in a fearsome display of power. Parker smiled.

"I've never met a demon before." She poked at Hardison's bright flames, burning her fingers and making him grumble with frustration.

"Look, do you want help with your enchantment or what? 'Cause I'll help but you have got to quit poking me."

Parker blew on her fingers lightly and asked, "Can you get this cursed thing off me?"

"I have ways. But you're gonna have to help me first."

"What do you want?" she asked, suddenly suspicious.

Hardison took on a mournful look. "I'm a prisoner here. Stuck in here, running Eliot's castle all up and down the world. No freedom at all! I want out. If you can find out the secret behind Eliot and me, and spell it out, then I'd be free. And then I'll break your curse."

Parker frowned. "But you're a demon. How do I know you'll keep your word?"

"Do you have a better idea?"

"I could ask Eliot."

Hardison did a double take. "Are you out of your mind? Eliot's crazy; he would eat you alive. No way he'd help you."

"I'm sure he's not that bad," Parker said, getting up from her chair to snoop around the room a little.

"Easy for you to say, you haven't had to live with him for the past forever. Is it a deal or what? And quit touching that, it's some kind of enchanted thing or other."

Parker set down the goblet she'd been inspecting and glanced back over at the demon in the fireplace. "Deal, I guess," she agreed. "Doesn't seem like there's anything else to do." She turned back to the trunk she was rooting through. "Except look at all this stuff! Do you know how much I could get for just-" She pulled out a dagger and held it up to the light. "Oooh," she cooed in delight.

Hardison dimmed his light to discourage her. "Hey, cut it out, that is Eliot's stuff. Nobody touches it but Eliot or me. Hey, granny. Hello? Are you listening? Crazy lady, hello?" He waved to get her attention, brightening the room enough to reveal the elderly woman doing her best to climb the shelves for a better view of the clutter on the mantle.

"My name's Parker," she called down to him. She looked back and winked at him. "And I'm a thief."

It was hours later when the door of the castle opened again and the lord of the house returned. The wizard was strong and powerful, but beautiful as well. Or he was normally. Now all Eliot was was tired. He paused at the top of the stairs and shook the shrapnel out of his clothes. Some of the small metal pieces were stained red. Hardison was less than sympathetic.

"Where have you been? And don't get shrapnel all over the floor, Parker just cleaned all that up!"

Eliot curled his lip at the fireplace. "Can it, Hardison," he growled. "Don't talk to me about shrapnel, I just flew through the wrecks of a hundred-" Then the demon's comment registered. "Who cleaned what now?"

In response, Hardison flicked a tongue of flame into the dark behind Eliot. Turning, the wizard found himself face to face with an old woman hanging from the rafters by her knees.

"Hi," she chirped, smiling at him. "I climbed up here to sleep. I sleep better upside down. But now my knees have locked up and I can't get down." She shrugged apologetically in response to his flabbergasted look. "I'm not usually this old."

Eliot just stared at her.

"I straightened up your stuff," she went on. "You had a lot of junk in here, you know that?" She left out the fact that a lot of his junk had ended up in her pockets. "But you can see the floor now," she concluded with a grin.

Eliot gaped at her for a few seconds longer before whirling to look at the room. Sure enough, the previous clutter had been stacked into neat little rows and piles. Nothing was as it had been or where it had been. Eliot's eyes flew all over, searching for this amulet or that potion bottle and not finding it. He couldn't find anything anymore! The old woman was a menace!

"Dammit, Hardison!"


End file.
